A Wish for a Kiss
by Justmeallthetime
Summary: She offered him a wish for a kiss, but Sesshomaru was pretty darn sure that she would not, unfortunately, include herself as part of the deal.


Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha.

She offered him a wish for a kiss, but Sesshomaru was pretty darn sure that she wouldn't include herself as part of the deal.

A Wish for a Kiss

There was something dreadfully wrong with Kagome, and not just in the usual way either.

Now the girl was always strange, what with her short, scandalous clothing, infectious cheer, and uncommon loyalty. If pressured and tortured for his opinion, Sesshomaru would even go so far to admit that he considered all of those things to be a plus in his book. A plus, he grudgingly admitted, that he would award no other human up to date.

But Kagome had changed.

Ever since his very foolish little brother had departed for hell with Kikyou, the young miko had been acting a bit… _oddly_. Like giving him 'surprise hugs' until he overcame his kill-on-sight urge. Or planting weeds around the old Bone Eater's well. Or her final act of horror: _cooking him 'ramen'_. And she didn't even laugh it off when she burnt the entire meal to a black crisp.

But even with all of her new oddities accounted for, Sesshomaru never imagined that Kagome would _proposition_ herself.

"A wish for a kiss," she offered simply. "You can have anything you like."

Like so.

Sesshomaru stared at her wan cheeks, her disheveled hair, her solemn eyes. She really didn't look like the Kagome he had come to know at _all_. But then again, lately there was nothing familiar, nothing identifiable about her, only changes. How her great leaps of faith had slowed to crawling, measured footsteps and she was just, overall, a muted human being.

In short, everything he wanted to happen to humans everywhere; only not to _her_.

"I wish you would leave," he replied softly. To kill her would be pointless, but Kagome was fast-becoming a nuisance. An apparently suicidal, wanton nuisance. Why a kiss, of all things? Why didn't she scream and rage at him, something she _must_ have adapted from his brother, in that extremely annoying shriek of hers? Without it, he was finding it hard to hate her.

"Then kiss me, and it will come true." Kagome insisted. He wished that she wouldn't offer him one of the few things that he would never _ever_ take her up on. Sesshomaru purposefully stared at her bangs. Not into her eyes, and certainly not on her lips. Not after she had unconsciously resurfaced some of his past _ideas_.

"Don't you… want to?" She asked, and the demon closed his eyes in wary, weak self-loathing. Those who had lost their minds weren't supposed to be able to decipher emotions or read into them. Against his better judgment, against his very will he _did_ want to kiss her and it was the most awful thing to want.

And he had wanted it for a very long time.

_I am my father's son._

"Sesshomaru?" Her voice was much closer this time, and tinged with hope. By the time he dared to open his eyes, Kagome stood almost toe to toe with him, eyeing him with warm confusion and longing, a longing for something he probably could not give. Was she thinking of his brother…?

His head began to pound; too much hatred all around.

"Go away." It was all he could do to not kill her right then and there. _Of course _she was thinking about Inuyasha, she had to be. Since when _wasn't_ she devoted to the hanyou? And why _wouldn't _she be, even after Inuyasha was gone? Did he, Sesshomaru, ever stand a chance?

"No!" Stubborn, stupid girl. He hated her persistence. He loved it. He wanted everything about her. "Kiss me, and your wish _will_ come true."

Sesshomaru's heart began to ache in a disgustingly weak way. He couldn't _have_ what he wanted, she was irrevocably taken.

"_Leave_ miko, and seek help. You will not find it here," he muttered, but he found that it hurt either way. To watch her stay and make him offers that he very much wanted to take her up on was masochism, pure and simple, but the sight of her walking away indicated that she might not be coming back.

He bit back a groan. There was never any winning with humans.

Kagome shuffled her feet impatiently. The top of her head meet Sesshomaru's chest – as dwarfed as she was compared to him – and she opted to stare at it rather than to look him in the eyes. She cleared her throat uncomfortably and began again, softly.

"I _am_ seeking help. _Yours_. And don't you dare try to send me away, because you're the only one that can help me. Do you… do you really hate me that much to turn me away like this?"

_Hate her? _The damned guilt-trip at its finest.

"S-So," Kagome continued nervously, playing with her fingers. "If you want to – _if you care enough to help me_, you'll kiss me. And I'll make your wish come true, I promise. Cross my heart," she finished with a weak smile, her eyes darting up to his quickly before returning to his armor.

She was so unintentionally heartless. "How will this help you in the slightest –"

"_Please."_ And so desperate, he realized, to be asking him.

And so slowly – it was extremely hard to talk yourself out of something when your brain could barely _function_ properly – he rest his hand upon her waist and pulled her closer.

Kagome squeaked. "And um… _ah_, w-what's your wish?"

_I want you._

Sesshomaru focused on her lips. What painful reminders. _But my wish is irrelevant._

And just as Kagome, oddly nervous for one so insistent, opened her mouth to ask again, Sesshomaru kissed her.

_Unattainable._

It was sweet, sweet torture and he loved and hated every bit of it. And for that, he loved and hated every bit of himself. There was _no way on Earth_ that he was supposed to feel that way, for _her_, from a _kiss_. The kiss was so simple and so chaste, but Sesshomaru swore that he could feel her from his lips to his toes to his nerve endings. Her hands were raking across his abdomen and her hair was sliding across his face and of course _none of that was actually happening_, but –

_Undeniable._

He was going crazy too.

They broke apart simultaneously.

Kagome, who was red, stared down at her feet while Sesshomaru, who was stunned, stared down at her shamelessly.

"What do you want?" Kagome mumbled again.

"_You._"

"_What?" _Her eyes were wide, almost childlike. It killed him.

Sesshomaru cleared his throat treacherously. "… to leave. Go back to your village and…" he faltered for a bit; how was it possible that he hated himself even _more_ after the kiss than he did before? Wasn't it what he wanted?

"And?"

"And do not seek me out again." There, he said it. He had stolen a kiss but his line was still untainted and _kami, _from the pounding of his heart to the crushed look on her face, he felt like an ass and a fool all wrapped up in one.

But Kagome seemed – _looked_ relieved. His heart began to fracture. "Not what I expected," she admitted, a slow sure smile stretching across her face. She giggled, "Definitely not."

_Ah. _So it was… a joke? But she had looked so _earnest_, and he had craved her just a little more than he could take –

"Go. Leave now." He was seriously going to kill her if she didn't get the hell out of there. Like, immediately. It was a betrayal; his opinion of her had been so obviously _screwed_, because she wasn't _sweet_ or _lively_ like she had been before, and she wasn't _hurt_ or _mourning_ or even _crazy_ like he'd thought, and still loved her for. She was just a wench who played with his heart; hell, she probably even assumed that he didn't have one in the first place.

"No," Kagome breathed and stood her ground even as he growled at her murderously. She absently brushed a few strands of inky hair behind her ear, but her still, amazed – _happy_ – gaze remained locked on his.

"I'm staying until you tell me what you _really _want. No lies."

"What I want?" Sesshomaru flexed his fingers and took a step away from her. She really made a fool out of him. It _stung_.

Kagome narrowed her eyes and matched his step with her own. "Correction, _who_ you want. I want your damn honesty."

So she suffered from mood swings too; what an unfortunate life she had led thus far. Perhaps, Sesshomaru thought, it would make it easier to end it.

"I owe you nothing," he replied loftily.

"_Nothing?_ What about the truth? I think I at least deserve that Sesshomaru!"

"Hn." In her mind she probably did. But in his, she was nothing but a treacherous bitch and he really wanted nothing more than to –

_Kill her?_

Throw her over his shoulder and take her away to someplace secluded.

"This is just so – _argh_! What is _with_ you dog demons and avoiding the question? Inuyasha did the same thing _all the time_! Just admit it! You _like_ me and I – "

"Do _not_ compare me to my brother."

"_Half_ brother, you nitwit, and it's kind of hard not to when _you act just like him_!"

For a while he just stood there flabbergasted. "I do _not_ – and you can't… _take that back_."

"No."

"Take it back _now_," Sesshomaru said dangerously.

"… Sesshomaru," the girl sighed. "I'm not taking it back. Plus just… look at us!" She said, gesturing with her hands. "We're acting like total kids."

The demon sniffed imperiously, "_You _might be.

"We _both _are. Look, can we… can we just talk?"

"I have no interest in talking with you."

Kagome ignored him.

"I thought… after I kissed you, that you would, errr… act on some demon impulse and carry me off or something – I've seen it happen before, _weird stuff_. Which is why I was so…" Kagome turned cherry red, "relieved afterwards when you tried to send me away."

So it wasn't because she was only interested in kissing the closest thing she could get to his brother?

"I don't care."

"_Yes_, you do! And even if you don't, can't you just hear me out? This is important… to me – "

"I don't care about _you_."

"Right." Kagome looked tired and slightly hurt. "But I care about _you _and I thought that mattered."

"You care about my brother."

"_Half_ brother."

"Nevertheless," he snipped coldly. "The feelings that you had – _have_ for my half-brother do not extend to me. Do not mistake me for him." And there was the heart of the matter; she was using him as a substitute, and he wasn't going to have just a _part_ of her.

"You love me," she said simply.

"…"

"Don't you?"

"…"

"Sesshomaru!"

"… _Perhaps."_

Her smile was small and barely noticeably, but it played on her lips nevertheless. "Then make _my_ wish come true."

_What?_

"_You_ love _me_," he said tentatively. He had to be sure of what she was asking.

"…"

"_Miko._"

"_Alright, _alright I love you," she said, flushing red. He stared her down, once again, without shame. Did she really – what a _mess_ of mass confusion – love him for _him_? His body was closing the distance between them of its own accord, but his brain was still warning him, whispering doubts which were, disturbingly, mostly true. She couldn't _actually _love him. Logically, by blood even, they were enemies. He was supposed to hate her, not love her. She was supposed to hate him also, out of misplaced anger, for the death of Inuyasha and then he would have killed her. _Nothing _was working out like he thought it would.

And, cursing his sad brain, he seriously doubted that they would ever work out as he _hoped._

"Lies, miko." She was beginning to look angry again, her lips pursed and her cheeks red, so he made sure to continue quickly. "Unintended, but lies all the same. You do not love me, you are still foolishly caught up with my deceased brother. I appreciate your…" _What were the right words for this?_ He was single-handedly throwing away his only shot at his desires out of respect for them both and, by proxy, Inuyasha.

The words soured in his mouth as he spoke them. "I appreciate your intentions." _I only wish you meant them. _And his heart just _gave way_ completely, because Kagome, bright-eyed and fiery thus far looked how he felt: utterly depressed.

"I wished for you, not Inuyasha," Kagome said quietly.

"You have never – "

"_I don't think you quite understand me Sesshomaru_. Inuyasha wanted to stay, with me. And then Kikyou came out of nowhere, he turned her down, and she started _crying_. I couldn't believe it – I didn't even know that she _could_ cry. Anyway, he said that he loved me now, not her, and that he couldn't keep his promise."

Sesshomaru could only stand in his place, completely shell-shocked and confused and a tiny bit angry. The hanyou had _absolutely no right_ to profess love to Kagome, when he already had a lover there; besides, Kagome was _his_. The asshat (Inuyasha) was lucky that he was already in hell, because Sesshomaru was fully prepared to do worse. Much worse.

"At first, I didn't know what to say. I mean, it was what I wanted, _what I thought_ I had wanted for a long time. But I couldn't look him in the eyes and tell him 'yes', you know? It felt like… it felt like opening a present and finding the cheap knockoff version of what you actually wanted." Kagome laughed hollowly, "in fact, I think that's what he saw in me after he lost Kikyou the first time."

Never, Sesshomaru vowed silently. He would never make that mistake, not if he could keep her.

Not if she would give him one, final chance.

"But the thing is, I _wished_ for you. On the jewel. It… it didn't work. I guess I can understand why now… it's quite the selfish wish, huh?" She finished with a watery smile.

"Yes," Sesshomaru agreed. "Very."

"And… I suppose you think I'm a fool for wishing for it too?"

"Absolutely," he affirmed.

"Oh. I… I guess I can understand," Kagome whispered, blinking rapidly. But Sesshomaru could see that she very obviously did not understand, and so he sought to change that.

"It was selfish," he admitted, slipping his finger underneath her chin and lifting it. "But I am a selfish man and I can only… _appreciate _your efforts."

"But I'm still a fool right?" She asked, closing her eyes.

"Very much so," Sesshomaru smirked. "How _foolish _of you to wish for something that you already had. That is why the jewel did not work."

Kagome's eyes popped wide open. It took several, subtle checks for Sesshomaru to assure himself that she was still breathing, but by the time he did, her face relaxed and broke out into a dazed, happy smile.

"You… you _love_ me," Kagome teased, wiggling her eyebrows. She looked perfectly ridiculous, and Sesshomaru loved every second of it.

"Perhaps," he admitted, shrugging his shoulders lightly.

Kagome very happily melted into him. "Then make my wish come true!"

"And what of mine?"

"_Ours_ then. And be quick about it. You're a very tough cookie to crack, and I don't want to go through this whole process _all over again_ when you change your – "

He interrupted. "As you wish Kagome." And he kissed her _vigorously_, because it was all he could do to not throw her over his shoulder and make off with her.

Which was apparently weird and not to her liking. Oddly enough though; Sesshomaru personally thought that it was a very effective method for getting to private getaways and –

"And stop thinking all the damn time, _especially_ when you kiss me. I _swear_ it will get you nowhere."

… But that was that.


End file.
